Gryfalcon
by Jimaine
Summary: The Black Gryphons mate Zhaneel was the first of her kind, abused because her parents were killed when she was young. This is the story of her parents, how they fell in love&how they died. Set during the Mage Wars. Please read and review! Aubri cameo
1. Littletuft

Disclaimer: Mercedes Lackey, genius she is, owns all this. Not me, and I'm not making anything off this.

Authors Note: This takes place more than a decade before The Black Gryphon, 987 BF (987 years before the founding of Valdemar), during the Mage Wars

  
  


Chapter I: LittletuftRikashi Levonkae cocked her head at her instructor. The human wasn't from one of the Kaled'a'in Clans, nor had he ever worked with gryphons before. If he had, he'd have known that Rikashi was vexed.

"Why isn't this working?" she demanded. "I was diagnosed as a Master Mage, this should be simple!" the female gryphon bristled, her ivory-and-red feathers on end in annoyance. Her beak was slightly shorter than most gryphons and her wings, fluttering in annoyance, were a little too pointed. She was lithe and slim, body taunt with the training that had consumed her life and those of every other gryphon. A year over mature, she had only been on two long-distance missions; she didn't seem to be suited for them. The mandatory testing for mage-gift had begun a few months ago, and the Master attempting to teach her couldn't explain why she was only able to do some of the things a Master Mage should be able to accomplish. Even is she wasn't suited for long-distance combat, she could be useful if she was a Master.

The human sighed, taking a step back from the irate gryphon. "Levonkae, take a day off. Maybe you've got a block. It happens sometimes."

Rikashi stalked off, talons ripping into the soft ground of the camp, towards the aeries.

A familiar mottled brown shape laughed as she stormed into the aerie. "Bad time, Rika?"

"Shut your beak, Aubri," Rikashi snapped at the male. She had known Aubri longer than she cared to remember, and his aerie was right next to hers.

"Littletufts, calm down. You can't expect to become a full Master in a few months!"

"I could to. If I could just figure out how to do it!" Rika growled as she slumped down in the shade of the awning over the entrance of her aerie.

"If you could figure out how to be a Master Mage in a few months, every Journeyman and Apprentice mage would flock to you, begging to be taught."

"Ugh."

"Yup. Ugh describes it perfectly.

"This means I have to do this the hard way, doesn't it?"

"Yup."

Rikashi sighed.


	2. War is Boring

Taveon Hidorkae chased another quren down, the fleet-footed, deer-like creature darting faster than most gryphons could dive. Taveon slid through the air after it, single feather-flicks changing his direction with ease. His partner on the wing had fallen behind a mile back, shouting that Tav was coming within a hair of too close to Ma'ar's territory.

Tav may have gotten too close, but he also got the quren.

"About time, slow poke," Tav caroled as Ekon landed beside his kill. "And we get too few chances at fresh meat as it is."

"Which is why they assigned you to the hunting squad – you know that, right?" Ekon said as he and Tav secured the quren in the sling they would use to carry the beast back to their regiment.

The gray-plumaged gryphon sighed. "Yes. That was the official reason. The real reason is that I don't have to endurance to keep up with anyone else."

"You've got the fastest dive in the entire wing, Tav," Ekon reminded the depressed gryphon.

"Which means nil if I can't get to the fight in decent shape," Tav retorted as he and Ekon tool to the air. 

Ekon sighed. He had only known the other gryphon for a few months, since Tav joined the First, and he had already figured out that he had not only a massive inferiority complex, but barely made it through the basic training required of gryphons who fought in Urtho's thrown-together army. "Tav, you know how boring it is to eat herdbeasts day in and day out. The gryphons and the _kyree_ both would go insane without a little interest in the diet."

"So everyone says. I'm just tired of being a second-rate, not _quiet_ good enough gryphon. I take the farthest back positions, and can't handle any long flights! It's just not in the way I'm built!"

"Hey, in this mix-matched creature Urtho dubbed an 'army', we may be the most important people. Keeping morale up and all!" Ekon gryph-grinned at his partner, who grinned back. "_Sketi_, the most interesting thing that happens around here is what we bring back!"

"After all," Tav chuckled, a deep gryphonic laugh that vibrated the straps holding the quren. "War is boring!"


	3. Chosen

Disclaimer: The genius Mercedes Lackey and her husband own all this with the exception to the fact that I made up the names of Zhaneels parents and their story. And Mika. Don't even try suing, you'll just loose money in a court case.

A/N: I apologize for taking so long to update. I'm on an updating splurge at the moment, 'cause I finally got around to copying everything out of my written notebooks and into the computer. I hope the next update comes soon, but I have, like, six tests next week and _three_ multipule-chapter fics, so just know I'm doing my best!

-**Shameless Advertising**: Go read my other stuff if you have even the remotest intrest in any of the following categories: X-Men, Star Wars, ElfQuest, an original that no one's read, and Harry Potter. My friend also has a great X-Men fic called Nightshade, by Nightshade Darkholme. Go. Read.

Ahh, yes. The actual story!

* * *

Urtho, the Mage of Silence, was tired. He had wanted to spend the rest of his life with his creations, his children, the gryphons. Watching them grow and change and outlive his short existence.

Then a young upstart named Ma'ar spoiled every plan down to the smallest and left only one man capable of defending the ragged remains of a dozen kingdoms: Urtho. His status as a life-Adept hadn't allowed him to step aside, leaving himself a tiny corner of creation as his own and the gryphons, as he often wished he had. Instead, he organized a war.

He threw his wonderful, marvelous masterpieces, only three generations old and altogether too suited for long-distance combat, into the fray against an evil Adept. And his favorite, all he admired in gryphons, perhaps the only son he would ever have, was the famous -- and infamous -- Black Gryphon. Only just mature in body and mage-craft, Skandranon had been there the day Urtho became a warrior-mage. And since then, Skanhad flown directly to the tower more than once, demanding to be allowed on certain missions he felt only he could handle. All his gryphons were like that; many were direct to a fault.

And now he was frantically searching for two who could possibly survive, let alone succeed, on the near-sucide mission he needed to send them on.

Speed. Small. Agility. Intelligence. Journeyman mage at the very highest.

Skan wasn't the smallest gryphon, but what had disqualified him was his status as a Master Mage. The camp was so well-guarded that if anyone with more power than a Journeyman entered they would be victim of more horrible spells than Urtho cared to consciously think about.

His last team had certainly proved that . . .

The Mage of Silence winced as his thoughts drifted back to the pair of gryphons, both Masters, that he had originally sent to spy out the camp. Both broadwings and not incredibly fast, they had been captured, tortured under the watchful eye of Ma'ar (who was, of course, immune to the guard-spells against mages), and given -- alive -- to the creatures they had been sent to spy on. Makaar. Having seen how successful Urthos gryphons were, Ma'ar had decided to counter-attack, and the few gryphons who had stumbled into them had all perished.

_Taveon Hidorkae, 11th of the First. Journeyman, fast enough to catch the fastest prey, and too small to qualify for most missions_.

"Mage Urtho?"

Urtho beckoned the tervardi in, noting almost absent-mindedly that this was the second time he'd seen this tervardi, usually a shy people. "Gev'gich, if you don't mind, I'm fairly busy at the moment. Is there a better --"

"Pardon this one, Mage, but this one believes that you are making a mistake with a gryphon named Rikashi."

This brought Urthos head up. The solitary tervardi rarely interacted with other species, even within the multi-species thing he had dubbed an 'army'.

"Rikashi? She hasn't been --" Urtho was almost embarrassed. There had been a time when he'd known every gryphon, what they were doing, and their health status. The tervardi shifted from birdlike foot to birdlike foot with nerves. "This one is a mage, little more than a Journeyman, but skilled in judging how much ability other mages possess. This gryphon, one Rikashi Levonkae, was judged by a human to be a Master."

Urtho nodded, hoping Gev'gich had a point.

"Rikashi is no Master, Great One, but a simple Journeyman like this one. The human who judged her did not account for her status as a made and therefore magical creature."

Urtho bolted upright. _Of course!_ That_ is why so many gryphons have been inaccurately judged ahead of their true gift! And if Rikashi is only a Journeyman . . ._

"Thank you, Gev'gich, you have just solved a lot of problems for me," Urtho informed the tervardi.

"This one is humbled by your thanks and honored by the service, Adept."

Gev'gich slid quietly out while Urtho sat quickly compiling everything he knew about Rikashi. She was -- 

She was his Kecharas only living relative, an older sister who, like all the others, had no idea she existed. But Rikashi would be perfect for this. Built along the same lines for speed, with a smaller, lithe body, and more endurence than Taveon, who was a 'sprinter'.

_Rikashi Levonkae and Taveon Hidorkae_.

"Mika --" Urtho called, and a lizard like head poked the door his hertasi help used.

"Urtho?"

"Send for two gryphons, Rikashi Levonkae and Taveon Hidorkae."

"Of the First and the Fifth Crimson?" Mika nodded at Urtho. She knew every hertasi who worked with the gryphon wings, and therefore where almost every gryphon was stationed and likely to be at any given moment.

"I believe so."

"Taveon recently returned from a hunting forray and Rikashi is still in her magic lesson," Mika told him. The sensible lizard-woman nodded succinctly and turned out, her tail swishing behind her like a housewifes skirts.

Urtho chuckled. Mika and her nephew Gesten were among his favorite hertasi, and he would have been mad at Amberdrake for hiring Gesten if the kestra'chern wasn't sharing him with Skan.


End file.
